Lucy turned and tried the door, but it was locked. Josh kicked it hard, several times, to no avail.
“Stand back,” ordered Lucy, drawing the lieutenant’s gun and pointing it at the lock.
She pulled the trigger. The noise of the gunshot reverberated around the neighborhood as the lock fragmented.
They rushed inside and slammed the door. Darkness. They’d dropped their flashlights on the way, so Josh pulled out his phone. The minimal light from the lock screen illuminated his hands and a little of his face as he fumbled, trying to activate the flashlight setting. A beam of light shot out from the back as his fingers found the right buttons.
“We need to barricade the door!” whispered Lucy.
“Grab this!” hissed Josh, sticking the phone in his teeth, the beam shining down onto his hands as they took hold of a work table.
Lucy felt her way to the far end of the table and lifted, the two of them shuffling the heavy thing all the way up against the door.
Lucy took a step back. Her heel hit something cold and hard, which tipped over with a clatter. Josh spun around and illuminated the paint tin, which rolled loudly across the garage floor until it met the far wall. Something shuffled in the darkness.
Lucy trained her gun in the direction of the sound as Josh cast the light around until it landed on the source. A child cowered in the corner, shielding its eyes from the glare.
The child was filthy. His hair was greasy and matted, his clothes covered in dirt and food stains. Lucy approached slowly and tried to sound reassuring.
“Hey, hey, don’t worry, we’re not gonna hurt you,” she said, but the boy only recoiled further among the piles of cardboard boxes.
“Josh, he can’t see what we look like, shine the flashlight on us!” said Lucy.
Josh obeyed and illuminated his own countenance, revealing beads of sweat covering his pale forehead.
Lucy made her way towards the child as Josh turned the light on her.
“Lucy,” said Josh, with dread in his voice.
“What?” she said, freezing.
“Your leg,” said Josh. “It’s bleeding.”
She looked down at her leg and for a moment time stopped. Blood trailed from her calf, leaking out of a cut that had torn through both her jeans and her skin. Josh turned his light to the floor, and to the trail of blood leading from Lucy. He traced it all the way back to the barricaded door.
Josh backed up towards Lucy and the boy. Turning his back to them, he kept his light pointed at the doorway.
“Seal it, quickly!” Josh hissed over his shoulder, not looking around.
“With what?” cried Lucy. “The first aid kit was in the bags, and I can’t do anything here without light!”
“Ask the kid!” urged Josh.
Lucy turned back to the child, his slender outline barely visible in the light reflecting off the basement door.
“Please, do you have any bandages or cloths down here? Or another flashlight?” she asked earnestly. The quivering child only shrank further into the pile of cardboard.
Lucy spotted a white rag hanging over the top of one of the boxes and snatched it, tearing it in half. “Josh, can I get a little light over here?” she whispered, struggling in the darkness.
He didn’t move.
“Please?” she implored.
Josh yielded and swung the light around, training it on her leg.
“Hurry,” he insisted.
Lucy grabbed the first half of the rag and dabbed away the excess blood. A lot had soaked into her jeans. She grabbed the second half of the rag and tied it around the wound tightly, stemming any further bleeding.
The door rattled violently in its frame, shaking the heavy table propped against it.
The child yelped and burrowed further into the boxes. Josh spun around and trained the light at the door once again. Another great thud, louder this time, shaking the table further.
A scratching sound came through the brick as the creature dragged its claws along the exterior of the basement. A screeching din took over as the claws reached the blacked-out windows. The screeching continued all the way along the window until the claws reached brick again. Then silence.
“Get behind me,” whispered Lucy.
Josh and the child huddled behind her, Josh’s light directed over her shoulder at the blacked-out window, Lucy’s gun trained on it too.
Wood splinters flew through the air as the beast crashed through the door and reared up onto its hind legs. Lucy stumbled backwards and tripped, falling to the ground. The child screamed as Josh illuminated the creature. Lucy let off four rounds directly at its chest. The beast roared in pain, lashing out and knocking Josh to the floor. Josh’s phone landed beside him, its flashlight shining upwards to reveal the beast’s teeth sinking into his head.
Lucy glimpsed the creature’s internal organs through the wide, gill-like structures lining its ribcage. She fired three more rounds directly at them, sending the beast crashing to the ground.
Scrambling to her feet, Lucy grabbed Josh’s phone and shone it over him. He was gone; his skull had been crushed by the dead creature beside him. Noise from outside interrupted Lucy’s transfixion. The rhythmic falling of four heavy legs in sequence signaled the fast approach of the next pack member.
Lucy spun around, watching as the child disappeared through an interior door into the house. She raced after him, calling out as she followed his path up a flight of stairs.
As she reached the hallway she saw the kid up ahead. He had a small action hero backpack on and was unlocking the front door.
“No, don’t do that!” cried Lucy, chasing him as fast as she could, her feet sliding across the wet hallway as she ran.
It was too late; the child was away through the front door.
Lucy raced after him, leaping down the front steps and grabbing the kid as he ran out onto the street. She turned on the spot as an engine roar came from the left. Lucy grabbed the kid by his arm and ran towards the oncoming vehicle, desperately waving it down.
The car braked heavily, coming to a stop a few dozen yards ahead. As they hurried towards it an unseen hand pushed the front passenger door open from within. Lucy leapt into the car, pulling the child onto her lap and slamming the door, hitting the lock.
She turned to discover their rescuer. Toby slammed the car into gear, accelerating rapidly. They quickly regained top speed on the long straight road leading out of the town, and they raced into the darkness.
“Thank you! Thank you, Toby,” breathed Lucy, gasping to catch her breath, the child nestled under her chin. Only now did Lucy notice the blood across Toby’s face, and the small puncture mark below his ear. The boy wrestled Lucy’s arms off him and climbed into the back where he hid in the foot cavity behind the driver’s seat.
“Who’s that?” asked Toby, keeping his eyes on the road as he floored it away from Fraser.
“Toby, you’re hurt.”
“No shit,” he said, keeping his eyes on the road. “Do you know where the others are?”
“Josh is dead. I don’t know what happened to the others. I thought you went the same way as them?”
“We got split up,” replied Toby, “but I think they’re dead too.”
“Where did you get the car?” asked Lucy.
“You don’t recognize it?”
Lucy looked around, suddenly realizing the roof above them was partially caved in, and the window on Toby’s side was smashed.
“I managed to hide in a store for a while,” he said. “The entrance had been kicked in. Then I doubled back to where we’d been. I figured I’d chance it that the beasts had moved on by then, which almost worked out.”
He pointed to the puncture mark.
“Does it hurt?” asked Lucy.
“Yes.”
“Maybe I should drive?” she suggested.
Toby considered for a moment.
“That’s probably sensible,” he agreed. “I don’t imagine I’ve got long left.�
�
She looked at him, horrified that he was so ready to die.
“You’ll be alright,” she insisted. “You can make it, OK? Are you still bleeding, or is that someone else’s?”
“The blood’s mine, but it’s clotted now, so I’m done bleeding,” replied Toby.
“OK, good.”
“Not so much. A wound this size shouldn’t clot like that; it should need dressing. If it’s clotted, it means I’m probably gonna clot elsewhere soon. Maybe whatever the creature injected me with was poisonous or something. I don’t know.”
His hand moved to the puncture mark below his ear and prodded it, tentatively.
“If I’m right,” he said, “I’ll probably have a stroke soon, or my heart will fail. If I have a stroke, shoot me. If it’s the second one, let it play out. Understood?”
Lucy stared at him, open-mouthed.
“I mean it,” he insisted. “Don’t look at me like that. My wife died less than twenty-four hours ago, and I think my time’s coming up pretty fast too. I’m just telling you how I want to die. You owe me – I saved your lives.”
Lucy nodded, slowly, and swallowed. “Do you want to pull over so we can swap?”
“If we pull over, there’s no telling what’ll happen. Our best chance is to keep moving until daybreak.” He flicked on the cruise control. “Here, you take the wheel, then I’ll climb out under you and you can get into the seat, alright?”
“Um, OK,” said Lucy, not having much choice as Toby relinquished the wheel. The car swerved a little as she took hold. Toby climbed into the back, avoiding the child in the footwell.
“Good, now you move over,” he instructed from the back.
Carefully, and with some unavoidable swerving, Lucy moved across into the driver’s seat, wincing from the throbbing of her ribs. She adjusted the chair position so she could reach the pedals properly.
“I might get some rest,” said Toby, climbing back up front and easing into the passenger seat. “I don’t feel so great.”
***
Lucy barely had time to read the road signs as they sped through the darkness. If she’d read the last one correctly, Denver wasn’t far. The National Guard would be there – it was their nearest shot at finding safety.
An hour had passed on the dashboard clock since she and Toby had switched places. As they rounded another mountainous bend, an orange glow appeared on the horizon.
Lucy’s mouth fell open in dismay as the burning city came into view. The blaze reflected off the clouds above, turning the whole sky blood orange. Great plumes of thick black smoke twisted upward into the air.
Two other cars sped past in the opposite direction, beeping as if in warning of what lay that way. But Lucy couldn’t turn around; there was no safety behind her either. As they reached a fork in the road, she took the only option available and diverted south of the blaze. If she could circumnavigate the blaze of Denver, she could pick up the route to Kansas. It was further, but it was her next best chance if she wanted to reach DC.
***
Lucy had been driving for hours. Her legs were cramped and her brain was exhausted from deciphering the endless shapes that flew in and out of the headlights as they drove through the country in search of sanctuary. She was freezing cold, too, owing to the broken window, and the temptation to ease the airflow or pull over to sleep was immense. But the skulking eyes of roadside animals that sporadically reflected in her headlights were a sufficient reminder of the perils of stopping.
The faintest rays of grey sunlight began to ebb above the horizon as Lucy checked the fuel gauge a couple of hours later; they were low on gas, about to dip into the reserve line. She drove for another forty minutes, anxiously watching the gauge begin to flatline, until up ahead, to her infinite mercy, a gas station appeared.
It was deserted. No lights, no cars, no power. The pumps were never going to work.
Lucy pulled onto the forecourt and applied the handbrake. She looked into the back; the kid was asleep. She gave Toby a nudge.
“Toby, we need gas.”
He murmured faintly but didn’t open his eyes, burbling a little before rolling his head the other way and falling quiet again. He was deteriorating; most of the color had drained from his face and he was no longer coherent. She had to find help; she couldn’t just put a bullet in his head, for Christ’s sake.
She stepped out of the car into the weak light of the morning and approached the pump, lifting it from its holster and opening the tank flap. She squeezed and waited, but nothing came out. Obviously.
It reminded her of her gun, though, and she quickly checked the weapon was still holstered and primed before approaching the darkened store.
The door was open, so she walked in, shining Josh’s phone flashlight around the store for light. She climbed under the counter and looked around for the pump switch – but it was already on. Cursing her luck, she crawled back out from behind the till and surveyed the rest of the shop. Aha! Fuel cans.
She grabbed as many of them as she could and returned to the car, tipping each one into the tank before returning to the store to get more. She repeated the actions until the supply was exhausted, then scavenged for anything else that might be useful – seizing a state map as Helena had done, along with a pen from behind the counter.
Looking around the shop again, Lucy began to feel that something wasn’t right. The shop had been left open and yet nothing was missing. She moved behind the counter again; the key was still in the kiosk, and there was money in the drawer. But this time she noticed a slight patting underfoot – there was water beneath her feet.
She hurried back to the car with an armful of the only food and drink available. The two passengers were still asleep, unaware of the danger that had visited the area. Lucy jumped in and raced the car away from the desolate station.
Morning was in full flow by now, and, aided by a stolen can of Red Bull, Lucy continued onwards. She balanced the map on the steering wheel and circled the gas station, before tossing the map onto Toby’s lap.
When she reached for the map again an hour later, she brushed Toby’s hand. His skin was cold and clammy, dotted with sticky transparent beads. She gasped and slowed the car down. Toby was dead, and was in the first stages of decay.
She stopped the car along the side of the deserted road and walked around to the passenger seat. Leaning over Toby’s body, she unbuckled him, and, sliding a hand under each of his armpits, dragged his body from the car and lay it by the roadside. She looked at him for a moment and considered saying a prayer, but she didn’t know if he’d been religious or not.
Acutely aware of her blood-soaked jeans, she winced and undid Toby’s belt buckle. “Forgive me,” she muttered, as she maneuvered off his cargo trousers, attempting to keep his underwear in place as she did so.
His legs were beginning to glisten. Once the trousers were off, she turned them inside out to allow the damp interior a chance of drying. She removed her torn, bloodied jeans and put on Toby’s inverted cargo trousers. They were much too long, and loose around the hips. She folded the waist band over to expose the belt rings and tightened the belt to the smallest notch.
“So sorry,” she whispered, draping the discarded denim over his bare legs in an attempt to protect his modesty.
She rolled up both cargo trouser legs several times so they didn’t drag along the floor, then returned to the car and drove away.
***
It was afternoon by the time their stolen gas ran out. Toby’s empty seat still bore a wet imprint of his figure. The car spluttered to a halt next to a field indistinguishable from the thousands of fields they’d passed already. Lucy checked the rear-view mirror; the child was awake and staring out of the window expressionlessly, clutching his backpack to his chest.
Lucy stood by the car and anxiously surveyed the landscape, scouring it for landmarks she could cross-reference against the map. The nearest town was around seven miles away, give or take. Hiking at a child’s pace, t
hey were going to be pushed to make it by nightfall.
She walked around to the rear of the car and opened the child’s door. The boy recoiled slightly. He looked around eight or nine.
“We gotta walk from here,” said Lucy.
The child didn’t react.
“I’m Lucy, what’s your name?”
The boy said nothing and Lucy lacked the energy to try harder. She’d already saved the kid’s life, and they had a long distance to cover; small talk could wait. She checked the car for anything they could take with them, but it was basically empty. She slung her minimal backpack over her shoulder.
“Hey, can I see your bag?” asked Lucy.
The boy stared at the road, resolutely avoiding eye contact. His backpack was tiny, enough room maybe for a kid’s lunch and no more. Unless he was carrying a time machine, it was probably unlikely to revolutionize their situation, Lucy figured.
“Fine, whatever. Come on,” she said, setting off without looking back again. She could check his backpack later. He followed, as she knew he would.
They were hungry and thirsty, and between them had only the few snacks Lucy had been able to grab from the gas station. She’d been worried that the kid might slow her down, but unlike Lucy the boy was well rested, and as she entered her third day without sleep, the pair were evenly matched.
After an hour or so the child came to a complete halt in the middle of the road.
“Hey, come on! Look, we can’t stay here, we’ve gotta keep moving,” urged Lucy, reaching out and taking his hand. But the boy shook her off and stayed put, his eyes cast downward, his legs shifting uncomfortably.
“Listen to me,” she said, kneeling down in front of the boy, trying to make eye contact. “I know this is tough. I get it. It’s tough for me too. And I know you miss your mom and your dad, but –”
The ground around her knee began to warm. Lucy looked down at the dark patch of tar leading up to the child, whose pants were wet with fresh urine.
“Oh,” she said, standing up abruptly. She stepped back from the growing puddle. “I didn’t know you … Go over here! I won’t look, I swear.”
She turned the kid around to face the field and stepped back as he nervously pulled his pants down and finished pissing. There wasn’t much left; most of it was in his clothes now.
Convulsive Box Set Page 20